


What Ever happened to Cameron?

by GalaxyGazing



Category: Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-06
Updated: 2013-03-06
Packaged: 2017-12-04 12:45:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/710928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GalaxyGazing/pseuds/GalaxyGazing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Too much scheduling is a bad thing, but so is too much freedom. I know now that, to be happy, we need a balance. Otherwise, we sink too far to one side of the scale until it breaks, or we break. Cameron had thanked me on that day but, in reality, for teaching me this, I am truly grateful to him."</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Ever happened to Cameron?

**Author's Note:**

> Written August 8, 2009

I knew that Cameron didn’t have the best home life. What I didn’t know was just how badly it was wearing on him. His parents were always fighting and I think that’s the main reason it all went so bad.

He had a father who thought of his car like a son and his son like a punching bag. His mother drowned her banshee wails of a loveless marriage in pints of alcohol and left home for extended periods of time.

Cameron was the only kid I knew who actually felt _better_ when he was sick, because at least his folks had the brains not to unload the woes of their own miserable lives onto him when he was so weak—or it didn’t give them as much satisfaction.

I befriended him in fifth grade when I saw him sitting alone at a lunch table. To be honest, I didn’t approach him with the intention of being friends but, rather, to see if I could yank his chain a little. It was a challenge to a bored elementary school boy like myself: trying to make the quiet kid crack.

However, as soon as I approached him, I, too, saw what little fun it would be to pick on a kid who was already so distraught. What damage could I possibly do to a guy who beat _himself_ up every day? I quickly saw that my new challenge, the more difficult challenge, was to make him smile.

I tried to win that challenge for seven years.

It came in rounds. Each day was a new chance and, occasionally, I would win. Sometimes, I would make a silly remark or praise him backhandedly and catch a glimpse of a grin forming at the corners of his mouth.

Most days I’d fail, but I savored the times when I triumphed.

It was sixth grade when I asked him why I was never invited over to his house. I saw him tighten into himself, his brow scrunch up, his skin pale. I watched him tremble away from the idea and knew that I would visit his house only when he was ready for me to. I didn’t understand it then, not like I do now.

It was seventh grade when I saw him come in to school with a black eye. I was so naïve at the time that when he told me he slipped and hit his head on the kitchen counter, I laughed and believed him.

It was eighth grade when I saw his sleeve ride up and noticed the odd, crater-shaped burns on the underside of his forearms. When I asked him about it, he yanked the fabric down, scared and embarrassed as if he’d been caught naked. He told me it was nothing and was careful not to let me see his arms for a while, even going so far as to wear a sweatshirt over his gym uniform for the rest of the semester.

It was ninth grade when I was finally invited over his house. Cameron had vaguely referred to his parents as  _strict_ and begged me to behave. I was well-mannered that night and we got through dinner quietly without any problems. However, it ended on a sour note when his parents began quarreling after we’d gone upstairs to listen to some cassettes I had brought. Their voices resounded through the thin walls, drowning out the music, echoing all throughout the house. Cameron shut his eyes tight.

Tenth grade was when I saw him standing at the edge of my driveway. I don’t think he would have come in if I hadn’t gone and fetched him from the limbo of indecision in which he was caught. As I went to meet him, my smile faded when I saw the split lip, the bloodied nose and the purple cheekbone. He just stared at me, silently. I didn’t ask any questions because I knew he didn’t want me to, but I made sure that he spent the night.

In eleventh grade I met Sloan and devoted a good portion of my time to her. She was a year younger than me, but that hardly made a difference; she had the same fiery screw-the-rules attitude as myself and I found great pleasure in hanging around someone who wasn’t chronically depressed for a change. She was exciting and new and I was fascinated with her. I tried not to completely ditch Cameron and attempted to include him in our fun, but our definition of fun wasn’t at all enjoyable for him. Soon, it became obvious that he didn’t want to be around us when we were both together and, truthfully, we didn’t want him there.

I was a young adolescent stricken with love and thinking only of myself. I ignored important things that seemed meaningless at the time, like the fact that my best friend was taking more and more sick days.

When senior year came around, I made a deliberate effort to get all three of us together as often as I could. No doubt Cameron would go off to college after this year and, while I thought that it would be good for him to get away from his parents, I also knew that’d mean he’d be leaving me as well. As for my own plans after high school, I’d probably be flipping burgers. Sloan had another year still, but I wanted us all together for as long as we could be.

On one particular day, I planned the greatest day off in history—a day all of us could remember when we were locked in a lecture, or a cubicle, or a drive-thru. This was Ferris Beuller’s day off, but it was also Cameron and Sloan’s. I wanted us to share it and I look back on that day as one of the biggest successes in my history.

It would be three days later before I realized that my biggest success was also my biggest failure. My heart ached with his as I watched Cameron kick the front bumper of his dad’s beloved Ferrari. His nose threatened to run and his eyes were wet, but I didn’t stop him. I thought maybe this was what he needed: a release.

“I’m just tired of being afraid.”

His voice quavered and his shoulders shook as he wiped the tear away before Sloan or I could see it fall. I couldn’t decide if I wanted to comfort him or let him work his demons out on his own, but I hardly had time to make up my mind before the worst that could happen, happened.

All of us watched in horror as the car sped in reverse through the glass wall of the garage and cascaded catastrophically down the mountainside in a chorus of crunching metal and the high-pitched scream of shattering glass.

I saw his body clench in panic and I instantly offered to take the fall for the disaster, but surprisingly, Cameron refused.

Everything seemed to leave him in that moment, all senses of horror, stress, fear, sadness, and even happiness, until all that was left in him was a calm exhaustion.

At the end of the day, he thanked me. He _thanked_ me for the best day of his life, and I accepted his gratitude with a feeling of arrogant triumph because, at last, I had succeeded, I had won the challenge, I had made him smile.

But in the end, no one really wins. You just keep playing the game as long as you can, until fatigue consumes you and you can play no more.

It would be three days later before I realized that Cameron had not smiled because of anything I had done, but because he had finally made up his mind.

I found out from the school, of all places, the one building I tried so hard to avoid. It was from a counselor whom I had never seen before, one who spoke in a voice dressed up with fake sympathy, “A loss is never easy…”

What a useless thing to say, I thought.

Everyone knows that a loss is never easy, but only the people who have experienced it know just how damn painful it is.

It heard his name without hearing it, I registered what it meant without believing it and, for the first time, I ditched school without all the smoke and mirrors. I ran out of there, finding that my parents were already waiting outside to pick me up. They could tell by the look on my face that I already knew, so we drove home in a silence dampened with my suppressed sobbing.

Six months later I graduated from that cage of an education system. I never planned on going to college so, naturally, I didn’t. I got a job around here (fast food, as expected) but I think I’ll start up school again in the spring. Too much scheduling is a bad thing, but so is too much freedom. I know now that, to be happy, we need a balance. Otherwise, we sink too far to one side of the scale until it breaks, or we break. Cameron had thanked me on that day but, in reality, for teaching me this, I am truly grateful to _him_.

 

_“Ladies and gentlemen, you are such a wonderful crowd; we'd like to play a little tune for you. It's one of my personal favorites and I'd like to dedicate it to a young man who doesn't think he's seen anything good today–Cameron Frye, this one's for you.”_

 

\---

 

The End.


End file.
